Category: The Forty

This match was not a writer. He was one of those people who would tell anyone who listens long enough that he would make a great writer because he has so many great ideas. Our date eventually brought us there, to that moment of sharing, but first… Notes on The Writer: His dating profile was…

When I matched with The Traveler, it was right at the beginning of a long, empty week. No work, no kids, seemingly endless discretionary time, with the added bonus of a girls trip at the week’s end. He was in town visiting his family, which happened often enough, as he had grown up here and…

The Father was not the first, last, or only man I matched with who had kids. But when I think of him, my thoughts wander to his son and daughter (especially her), even though I never met them. It’d be easy for me to focus on how things ended (poorly), but for a moment I…

Most Neurotic 10. The Texter The Texter: Thanks for meeting me for coffee. Unfortunately I can’t stay long. I just found out my friend is in town for tonight only, and he wants to hang out. Me: Oh, no problem. Let’s just get to know each other for a bit, and we can both be…

One of my favorite things to have come out of The Year of Living Promiscuously is my relationship with The Confidante. He was one of my first matches. In fact, I met him on the same day that I had my first coffee with The Runner. He planned an ambitious first date: dinner, bowling, improv…

Three vignettes about men who didn’t make it all the way around the bases. 6. The Musician In hindsight, I feel bad about this one. Start to finish, I wasn’t that into him, and I’m ashamed to admit that I used him for dinner, kissed him chastely, then sent him on his way, visibly frustrated….

Or “How to Go From a Great First Date to Calling in Back-up to Retrieve Your Shit, in Less Than Three Months” Meet for brunch and spend two hours getting tipsy on bottomless mimosas and laughing until you’re nearly in tears. Go bowling, laugh some more, drink at a mall then window shop. Go on…

This has the potential to be a really long post, probably because my relationship with The Runner lasted longer than any of the other 40 matches, 8 months in total, interspersed with periods of (his) silence. But I don’t want to write, nor do I believe you want to read, a story that long. So…

My last post left me naked and abandoned in a hotel room. In addition to me, The Omen had also abandoned a case of beer, a brand new box of condoms, and a pair of his underwear. I’m not ashamed to admit that I took great pleasure in jamming his underwear into the trash can,…

Remember at the end of “The Opener” when I deleted the dating app? Yeah, well that only lasted a few weeks before boredom and forgetting set in and I reinstalled it. My next match, The Omen, showed up within my distance-based search radius because he was in town for the day for work. He lived…

Using dating apps to meet people is a singular experience. Having met My Ex when I was 18, I’d never really dated anyone but him. My utter lack of familiarity with modern dating norms left me feeling out of sorts — my hopes frequently raised only to be quickly dashed. The emotional up-and-down of it…